#freeform the bold type

[sapphiccharacterstournament]

Canon Sapphic Characters Tournament Round 1 (Bracket 6)

[miikarin]

Chants of Sennaar

tumblr may I interest you in a game?

I just finished playing Chants of Sennaar yesterday and now I am out here singing its praises. At its core, Chants of Sennaar (CoS) is a language-deciphering game wrapped in a puzzle game with a sprinkle of stealth. If you were already sitting up on that stripped-down description then wait until I make my case.

So the game is based on the myth of the Tower of Babel, you know, the biblical one where people were punished for working together by making them unable to communicate with each other and so this story takes place in a tower and in there, the people have stopped being able to communicate with each other. Your role is to decipher the languages and restore communication between the people.

And the game does this beautifully. You decipher the language through contextual clues from the environment like signs, murals, or through discussions/interactions with the people. Each language has their own grammatical rules and you get what seems to be a subset of each language, words that are relevant to the overall puzzle of a story that you are solving and ones that say something about the people who speak it.

The word puzzling/verification system works well with the game - allowing you freedom to type words freeform in the guessing stage then giving pictorial depictions when making associations. This meant that it helped me understand what ideas to look out for in conversations/the environment.

On top of all that, the visuals are bold and striking and the music is top notch. There's a demo of the game that you can play and the progress carries on to the full version if you then buy the game!

I played it over three streams so not a very long game but it was a great time indeed.

[insecateur]

"Search Tags" on AO3

I've noticed that a lot of people don't seem to be aware that this is an option, so I thought I'd write an informative post about the AO3 feature that allows you to look up tags!

What is this and where can I find it?

It's a page on Archive of our Own that can be accessed by selecting "Search" in the upper bar and then clicking on "Tags." Or by clicking this link, if you'd just like to go there right away!

As the name indicates, it's a form you can use to look up a list of AO3 tags corresponding to a keyword (or multiple.)

How can it be useful to me?

I think it can be useful in a number of ways! I'll try to cover most of the ones that come to my mind in this post, but there might be more I haven't thought of.

As a writer

For me, the Search Tags page is most useful as a fic writer (or general creator on AO3, for those of us who also post non-fic works!) I use it mostly to look up freeform tags and check pre-existing tags and canonicals. Technically, you can check canonicals by making a new work and entering a keyword in one of the sections, but for me, this is less of a hassle. Not to mention, this way, you can even see non-canonical tags that people have already used, some of which might be very popular despite not being canonicals!

(Why would a very popular tag not be a canonical, you ask? Well, I'm not an AO3 volunteer, so I can't speak on their behalf. But as someone who writes kinky porn, there are a couple of sex-related tags that lack canonicals but still span a large number of works. The most obvious example, to me, is "Free Use", which is used by over 1200 works, and is not a canonical tag. For those unaware, the difference between a canonical and non-canonical tag is that it cannot be filtered; as such, it does not have a separate Works/Bookmarks page.)

If you're part of a challenge, exchange, or fest that only accepts ships with a certain number of works (i.e. rarepairs) it can also be used to check whether a specific shiptag even exists in the first place or to easily find the Works page of a specific shiptag so you can double-check the number of works there. I will discuss this more in the next section.

As a reader

What inspired me to make this post was actually seeing someone asking on Twitter if it was possible to filter every ship involving one specific character. As far as I'm aware, this is not possible; however, you can use the Search Tags form to find all the existing shiptags (canonical or not) featuring said character, and then check every Works page individually. Not super convenient, but still better than trying to wrestle with the filters, I think!

Okay, this is all very interesting, but how does it work?

Using the Search Tags form

When you access the Search Tags page, you will be greeted by this form:

If you click on the little ? bubble next to "Tag name," it will show you the usual list of common modifiers you can use to look up keywords, just like in the "Search within results" option from AO3 filters:

Here, what you can do depends on what your goal is. I'll cover in the order of the suggestions I gave in the previous section of this post.

Looking up freeforms

So, let's say you're in the process of, or just got done, writing your newest fic. You want to tag it properly, but there's some stuff you're not sure can be covered with the canonical tags AO3 suggests to you when posting a New Work, and when you try searching keywords in the regular search, you get mixed results. This is where the Search Tags form can be very, very useful!

I'll use an example I've used in the past. You want to use a tag that gives your reader an idea of how the fic ends. To do that, you can type up "Ending" in the "Tag name" box. For this example, we'll decide we want only canonical tags, so we'll check "Freeform" and then "Canonical."

This gives use nine whole pages of canonical tags. Canonical tags are shown in bold to separate them from non-canonical tags, but as we're doing a Canonical search right now, you won't be able to tell the difference. Here's what (the top of) page one looks like:

Immediately, you might have noticed something is amiss. Because we haven't specified a fandom, the search is giving us tags that are fandom-specific, like "Abandon Ending (OMORI)," on top of giving us tags that are non-specific, like "Abrupt Ending." This can be a good thing or it can be a bad thing, like in this case where we just want a generic ending tag. Thankfully, there is an easy solution!

Indeed, tags on AO3 are sorted by fandoms... including non-fandom tags! So all we have to do is enter the Fandom as "No Fandom," and then...

Ta-dah!

Note that there are still fandom-specific tags that might fall through the cracks, as tag wranglers are obviously not infallible, being human beings doing volunteer work. For example, although I cut the screenshot short, the next tag on the list is "Memory's Crannies Ending (Ib)" which seems to have the "No Fandom" category incorrectly applied to it alongside its actual fandom, "Ib (Video Game)." There'll also be non-fandom results that are actually pointing toward specific fests, bangs, or similar events, like "No Happy Ending Fest."

However, as I've mentioned earlier in the post, you can technically achieve the same result by typing a word in the Freeform box when posting a new work and seeing what AO3 suggests. So let's talk about what this is most useful for, in my opinion: finding established non-canonical tags.

This time, let's say you're writing something spicy involving a trans male character being the Dominant partner in a D/s relationship. There is a "Trans Male Character" canonical freeform, but if you look up "trans male character" in the tag search, you may also find:

You might be wondering, what's the point of doing this? Well, in some cases, some freeform tags have a lot of uses despite not being canonicals. Even without getting into the extreme I've already cited, for example, the tag "Honor Bondage" has over 100 fics to its name. Since it's not canonical, and as such can't be filtered, it also can't be synned to, which means that the best way for people interested in honor bondage to find works easily is to have as many people using the most commonly used tag as possible. By guaranteeing that you're using a pre-existing tag, even if it's non-canonical, you're helping more people find your work.

(For those unaware of the term, "synning" refers to a non-canonical tag being made synonymous to a canonical tag. When looking at a Tag page (not its Works or Bookmarks page) you can see a list of all the non-canonical tags synned to it, like this:

I'll cover this again a little later.)

Generally, I also think it can be useful when you're not sure how to tag something and are looking for inspiration. Also, getting to see all the silly tags people have used is pretty funny.

Looking up ships

In this section, I'll cover both the "writer" and "reader" situations.

Let's say you're participating in an event that's all about rarepairs. The requirements are that your chosen ships can't have more than, say, 100 works. You've decided you want to write a ship involving your favorite blorbo, but you don't know if the ship you have in mind even exists on AO3.

For the sake of this example, we'll say your blorbo is Cloud Strife, and you want to write... (throws dice) Cloud/Reeve. Let's go back to the Tag Search, and this time we'll use the "Relationship" box.

We're going to look up canonicals first (for reasons I'll explain later) so for this step, you have to make sure you have the right phrasing to look up your character. In the example I'm using, I don't think it'll matter much (it's not like there are that many characters named "Cloud") but if you were looking for, say, Peter Parker rarepairs, you'll have to make sure to use "Peter Parker" and not just "Peter."

This is what our search looks like for now.

I have to go through a few pages, but on page 3, I find the Cloud Strife/Reeve Tuesti tag. It says it has four fics, but in my experience, the count can be a little messy, so we'll double check on the Works page just in case.

There we go! A tried and true rarepair. 🫡

If you can't find the ship anywhere in the list (even when double-checking by entering more keywords) it's probably because it doesn't exist at all. I'll use a less popular character as an example, Professor Birch from Pokémon:

Because there are so few results, you can tell right away that Professor Birch/Professor Sycamore doesn't exist. 😔 (Actually, when looking up "Any status," it does exist as a non-canonical that doesn't have any fic tied to it. BECAUSE OF ME. But I'll talk about this at the end of this section.)

Now, let's say you're a reader and what you're interested in is finding out how many ships Cloud Strife is involved in on AO3. You just want to read about your blorbo getting into all kinds of relationships. Good for you.

You like to live dangerously, so you're going to go as far as looking up "Any status." I'll explain what this implies in a bit.

I also want to make a note of something. I was previously under the mistaken impression that specifying a fandom for your Relationship searches would affect whether or not crossover ships show up. Unfortunately, this doesn't seem to be the case, as a Relationship tag seems to always have every fandom each character is involved in as a parent tag. (So, for example, Ardyn Izunia/Cloud Strife has all of these as parent tags: Ardyn Izunia, Cloud Strife, Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, and Final Fantasy XV.) I don't know if there's a solution to this. If you know of it, I'd appreciate you letting me know!

Immediately, the ~400 results for Cloud Strife Relationship tags jump up to over 1500. Amazing.

Now, the issue (imo) when looking up Relationship tags using "Any status" is that it'll also give you non-canonical tags that are synned to canonical tags, which means you'll just end up with a bunch of repeats. It'll be a lot of things like, One-Sided Zack Fair/Cloud Strife, or Past Aerith Gainsborough/Cloud Strife, or tags written in the wrong order like Cloud Strife/Zack Fair, or tags formatted wrong like Zack Fair x Cloud Strife.

Therefore, especially when looking up very popular character, I wouldn't suggest looking up non-canonical Relationship tags. For unpopular characters, though, the list should be short enough to be combed through without too much of a hassle. Unfortunately, this means you might miss newly created Relationship tags that haven't been made canonical yet.

I'd suggest trying more keywords in this case. For example, in the Cloud Strife/Reeve Tuesti example, I could have just looked up the full tag straight away:

Additional Information about Tags

To conclude this post, I'll talk about something some people might not know regarding AO3 tags.

Tags are actually added to the database as soon as they're either added to a drafted work, added to a bookmark, or approved for an exchange. So, for example, if you created a work, tagged it Peter Parker/Cloud Strife, saved it as a draft, and never ended up actually posting the fic, the tag will still have been created.

Similarly, in the Cloud/Reeve screenshot above, I would wager that the shiptags with "(CoFF7)" and "(FF7 Remake)" at the end were actually created for exchange purposes, so people could ask for specific versions of the ship.

This is also what happened with the Odamaki-hakase | Professor Birch/Platane-hakase | Professor Augustine Sycamore shiptag, which was created when I submitted the ship for an exchange a few months ago. As a result, it's empty because no work was posted for it (YET.)

This applies to all tags, including freeforms. This is why, when looking up tags using this method, you'll sometimes run into tags that have no work tied to them.

...Okay, I think I've covered all that I wanted to cover! If you have questions, please feel free to ask them in the comments of this post. I hope this can be of help to anyone. When I discovered this option a few years back, I was floored. I genuinely think it's really useful, as someone who has a hard time with the regular AO3 search.

If you got to the end of this (very long) post, thank you for reading!

[ao3feed-brucewayne]

Taming the Demon

read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/0muF5xl by OpheliasSong In a bold, and unconventional, retelling of Shakespeare's "The Taming of the Shrew," Raven faces an ultimatum: marry the notoriously unpleasant Damian al Ghul, or risk losing everything. As she navigates courtly scorn and Damian's icy demeanor, Raven grapples with the prospect of yet another loveless marriage for the sake of her people. The tale weaves a gripping narrative of power struggles, unexpected connections, and the challenge of taming a man deemed "untamable." Will Raven succeed in winning Damian's heart and securing her shires's future? Words: 5093, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English Fandoms: Teen Titans - All Media Types, Justice League vs. Teen Titans (2016), Teen Titans (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Teen Titans: The Judas Contract (2017), Justice League Dark: Apokolips War (2020), Batman (Comics), Taming of the Shrew - Shakespeare Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Categories: F/M Characters: Raven (Teen Titans), Damian Wayne, Cassandra Cain, Cassie Sandsmark, Tim Drake, Ra's al Ghul, Bruce Wayne, Rose Wilson Relationships: Raven/Damian Wayne, Stephanie Brown/Tim Drake, Tim Drake/Cassie Sandsmark Additional Tags: DamiRae Zine 2022, DamiRae - Freeform, References to Shakespeare, Shakespeare Quotations, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, shakespeare au, AU, Canon: DC Animated Movie Universe | DCAMU (2013-2020) read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/0muF5xl

[sisterdivinium]

I think someone mentioned mixing WN with D&D on Twitter a while back and I hope that, if so, "D&D" was being used as a synonym for RPG rather than actual D&D 5e (which you shouldn't really do because they aren't synonymous, but I know it's a common thing).

Adapting Warrior Nun into 5e rules seems a bit like fighting the system rather than working with it, at least to me.

Here is a game that depends on character classes -- how will you make it work when all characters will probably share the class of sister warrior? If the idea is to differentiate them through skills, then isn't it better to just ditch the concept of class altogether? Maybe take inspiration from something like Knave, Maze Rats, Cairn if one wishes to stick with a D&D-ish aura.

Fights in WN aren't all that long if you think about it; so how will you conciliate that with the HP sponges that 5e characters are? (An anecdote: the other day I saw someone complaining about their weak initial character, who had some 20 HP. Playing old school D&D, I've had players start with 4. Ask them if they weren't scared shitless of dying -- and if this fear didn't make them play smarter and end up valuing their PCs much more when they levelled up!)

The economy system of 5e (well, of D&D as a whole, really, including older editions) has very little in common with the one our favourite ass-kicking nuns would use -- would it even be necessary, if we assume the Vatican is responsible for providing them with gear?

I'm not asking any of these questions simply because I dislike 5e (which I do, I admit) or to dissuade people from mixing WN and RPGs (I even did it myself once and might or might not be doing it again with another play style and basic system in mind), I just ask that they take mechanics into consideration. 5e can be good for what it's made for (or so I'm told), but in this particular instance it seems inappropriate for WN.

If I may be so bold as to offer amateur designers some suggestions...

I'd start by taking a look at Nathan Paoletta's RPG Design Zine, just because it helps you think about what the hell you're doing.

Generic systems are just that, generic, but they can be much easier to adapt than something so heavily-coded for a certain type of game as 5e is. They can be more complicated (maybe GURPS, though you could go for Lite and consider getting, idk, Religion, Martial Arts, Low Tech, High Tech... Go explore) or lighter. I am a gigantic fan of Freeform Universal Classic, but you could do something cool with FATE or FAE, Mini Six, hell, I don't know! There's a good deal of generic systems out there.

You could be a little more daring, if versed in PbtA games, and hack one up yourself, why not?

All I'm saying is that you shouldn't be wrestling with the system to make this thing. Have it work for you, not against you; find something that can "translate" the show more easily than 5e does.

There's a whole world of games out there, a wealth of inspiration to work with. A lot of creators stick to 5e because it's popular and it helps them get visibility for their products -- and I don't fault them for it, but you aren't going to sell this, are you? You're not the IP owner. Others use 5e because "everybody knows the rules" -- which isn't true and, honestly, if you're going to change the whole thing up so it matches WN, then what's the use of knowing how rangers in a high fantasy campaign progress if you're playing nuns with guns?

I guess my point is: just don't tire yourself out trying to make an apple pie out of ingredients meant for chocolate cake.

[spaceshipsandstarwyrms]

Book of the Bizarre Classes: The Shaper

There are four new classes in the Book of the Bizarre by Brandon Elliott. Today’s feature is the shaper.

Khalil Wells, Water Shaper

Shapers are masters of the elements. Each shaper has dedicated their life to the control of a specific element, using primordial magic to shape it to their will. Some control flickering flames or the endless waves, while others control wild winds or solid earth. No matter their chosen medium, all share intense dedication and focus necessary to master such an ancient form of magic.

If seeing the shaper brings to mind Avatar: the Last Airbender, you’ve found one of the many sources of inspiration for the class! Choose between Fire, Water, Earth, and Air to focus your shaping abilities.

Creating a Shaper

A shaper is a master of a specific element, and focuses on using that element when fighting their foes. They are a freeform spellcaster that can shape their element to a variety of forms, both offensive and defensive.

Shapers are varied in personality, though each element seems to attract a specific type of person to learn to control it. Fire shapers are often bold and commanding. Water shapers are calm and discerning. Earth shapers are steady and methodical. Air shapers are free spirits.

When building a shaper, keep the following things in mind: Who taught me to shape, and what was their teaching style? What element do I control, and do I have specific shapes I particularly enjoy? How has my connection to my element affected my personality?

More details and a subclass under the cut.

Subclass Preview: Water

Frozen Bite

At 1st level, you can coalesce your blast to begin freezing your enemies. Each enemy damaged by your blast has all movement speeds reduced by 10 feet until the beginning of your next turn.  Additionally, you gain the ability to breathe underwater and gain a swim speed of 30 feet.

Natural Prognostication: Hydromancy

At 3rd level, you may manipulate a bowl of water to give you vision from afar. Staring into this bowl, you may gain vision of location. This acts as the clairvoyance spell, but it does not require material components, and you can never choose to hear, only to see.

Protective Waters

At 5th level, you begin to recognize water as a magical buffer. Whenever you use your blast, you may spend a bonus action to add your Wisdom modifier to a one type of Saving Throw against spells until the beginning of your next turn.

Greater Natural Prognostication: Hydromancy

At 7th level, you may stare into a large bowl of water and manipulate it to project a vision from even further afar. This acts as the scrying spell, but does not require a material component.

Chilling Cold

At 10th level, your mastery of cold becomes even more powerful. You may choose one enemy damaged by your blast. All their movement speeds are halved until the beginning of your next turn, instead of only being reduced by 10 feet. Additionally, increase your swim speed to 60 feet.

Whelming Wave

At 15th level, the force of your cold and ice grows strong. Whenever a creature takes full damage from your blast, they are knocked prone.

Master of Waves

At 20th level, you become a true master of water. All creatures that take full damage from your blast have all forms of movement speed reduced to 10 ft.

The Book of the Bizarre is available for purchase on February 2!

[ao3feed-superbat]

Flying Saucer Has A Whole New Meaning To It

read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/gjqS0de by Thicc_Personality Richard frowns at the anger in the man's voice towards Bruce...he knows he can pin this situation on the fact he is a literal child (and it would be a very good point to make) but he also knows better than to run off on dangerous missions without Bruce-ah...Bruce...the sudden thought of how worried he must have made his dad causes a wave of sadness to wash over the boy. Richard's lip wobbles and he sniffles, unaware of Superman's fretting at the sudden appearance of tears and snot as he mutters. "I-I w'nt B'tman!" Words: 2918, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English Fandoms: DCU, Batman - All Media Types, Superman - All Media Types Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Categories: Gen, M/M, Other Characters: Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson Relationships: Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Clark Kent, Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent & Bruce Wayne, Bruce Wayne/His Trust Issues, Bruce Wayne/His Paranoia, Bruce Wayne/His Jealousy, Clark Kent/His Curiosity, Clark Kent/His Inability To Leave Bruce Wayne Alone, Clark Kent/Enjoying Making Bruce Wayne Fluster Additional Tags: Humor, Fluff and Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Drugged Dick Grayson, Protectiveness, Protective Clark Kent, Protective Bruce Wayne, First Meetings, Flustered Bruce Wayne, Good Parent Bruce Wayne, Bold Clark Kent, Cute, Cute Kids, Clark Kent is Superman, Bruce Wayne is Batman, Dick Grayson is Robin, Gremlin Dick Grayson, Dick Grayson Needs a Hug, Dick Grayson Gets a Hug, Scheming Bruce Wayne, Bruce Wayne is Good With Kids, Superman loves Batman, Persistent Clark Kent, Aliens, Pasta, Flying, Flying Saucers - Freeform, Kitchenware read it on AO3 at https://ift.tt/gjqS0de

[libitinalucus]

AO3 Search is Awkward, Actually

Whenever someone criticizes AO3's search for being difficult or confusing, there are a lot of long-time users that chime in that it's the best and not confusing at all and even going so far as to belittle the people that don't get it, and I find that a very exhausting and just sad that new user's frustrations are blown off instead of maybe attempting to see things from their perspective. Because the truth is, while AO3's filtered works system is great, actually getting to that point is not as simple as some make it out to be. Allow me to extrapolate.

Say you've never used Archive Of Our Own before and you decide you want to browse it for the first time. In this day and age, I think many new user's instinct is to search for the tags to go directly to the themes you're interested in, like so:

Searching via Works has way more options out the gate and has filtering right from the start, but most new users, especially ones that grew up on tumblr or tiktok, are far more familiar with Tags when it comes to finding their way around, so this is the section they're more likely going to gravitate towards from the list of options. That's easy enough to find, sure, but then the weird part is when you start searching for stuff.

So naturally what's the first thing you do? Type in what you think is an approximation for a tag that should be there and hope that you'll get a set of options that is close to what you want.

But instead, what you find is this:

This is an awkward and confusing list, mostly full of weird variations of the same thing. Even with AO3's tag wrangling, there are loose-ends everywhere, especially for less popular entries. Now it is only by sheer luck that the most populated tag, Freeform: Teratophilia ‎(3364), is at the very bottom of my screen cap. I only manage that because I expanded my browser and it just so happened to be at the bottom of the list. But in many cases, the tag you're looking for might not as easily be found.

For those experienced with AO3, you would know that the most populated tag is clearly the one you're looking for. But for a brand new user to the service, it is very easy for that to be drowned out in the sea of information that has been presented and be overwhelmed and confused. And this is only for a small tag, in the case of much more variable tags, the Most Populated tag that you're actually looking for could be buried on the third or fourth or even thirtieth page. For anyone that doesn't know what they're looking for this is the point where they try one more thing to attempt to make sense of what they're seeing.

They go to the Sort By menu and look for a 'most populated' option but there is none. Just Name and Date Created. There is no ability to sort by 'most populated' tags, which would make it much easier for a person brand new to the service to find what they're looking for. If you're lucky enough that the thing you're looking for has been around a long time, then Date Created might help you find the tag, but this is not always the case. (this has happened to me, many times.) This is probably about the time any new user with no one to help them, will give up. This is the first hiccup in the issues with AO3's search.

But say they find the tag they're looking for, Date Created sorting can account for most tags, sure, maybe I'm making a big deal about a fringe case. But then we get into the issue of 'what if the tag you're looking for, isn't a common tag.'

For anyone brand new to AO3 with absolutely no context for its hierarchy, will likely have no idea that AO3 has a 'Common Tag' system. I used my example of Teratophilia, not only because of my personal bias, because I knew it wasn't a common tag. For those not familiar with what a Common Tag is on AO3, it is an 'Official' tag, as in officially recognized by AO3 and are most commonly media/character with some significant concepts thrown in. These tags are not only marked in bold in a list making them visibly distinct, but they also offer the robust filtering features that AO3 is known for.

When you look up something that might be highly populated, but isn't a common tag, you don't have the luxury of the tag being made more visible by a bold style, making it even more difficult to pick out from a list.

But say you find your tag easily enough, and you click on it. You are now presented with the results of the tag, but to anyone new, you'll see that you are offered no option to filter the works under that tag because you have learned the tag you want to search, isn't a 'common tag'. Without any context for what this means, it can be confusing to know what to do with this information.

They're going to see this page and go 'where's the filtering everyone's talking about, what the heck is a common tag' and get frustrated. Maybe they'll weed through the list presented but others may just leave the site because they don't want to manually search that many pages. They don't have the context to know that their best next step should be to search a much more general tag, and then refine it down from there because they don't know the difference between a 'Common Tag' or 'Additional Tag' and how to find it.

For many long-time users of AO3, they may be quick to point out that AO3 does have a glossary and an FAQ, and that new users should start there to sort out any confusion. But the glossary isn't much help when it lists the term 'canonical tag' but any new user's introduction to the tag will usually happen when they click on their first non-canonical tag and see that the description uses the term 'common tag' as shown above. This makes it inconsistent to anyone not familiar, where to start when looking up this information to find context.

If your first encounter with the concept of the 'Canonical Tag' is to see it referred to as a 'Common Tag', but you go to look for it in the FAQ and you don't see 'Common Tag' in the list, you're going to feel like you've hit another dead end. This will likely be another point where new users stop using the site.

This means that if someone's first experience with the site is looking up something not popular and not 'canonical', they're going to get lost very quickly, and the usual means that they could have used to find their way around, simply aren't there. This is made more confusing/complicated by inconsistent use of terms on the site, and lack of using both terms on the glossary. This is very easily and simply solved by changing the glossary entry to Canonical Tag (Common Tag), as well as providing direct links to the Glossary/FAQ sections when searching.

But that's not the only issue, say if you do actually click on one of the 'Canonical Tags' for the first time, this is what you're greeted with:

Especially for some of the most populated tags, you are presented an absolutely overwhelming amount of visual noise and no actual search results. Long time users will know the next step will be to click on Filter Works, but anyone new will likely find that small text downed out by the absolutely massive wall of synonymous tags, along with the list of subtags that follow below it. New users probably haven't learned the buttons at the top right corner also link to using the tag in a search.

It can be very strange to a new user how clicking on a non-canonical tag will result in getting a listing of works right away, but clicking on a canonical tag will not. I'm aware that this because the tag page is a landing page to provide additional information/context, but there isn't even a description on this page for what the tag means so it doesn't even serve that purpose. I am of the opinion that the sections such as synonymous tags and subtags, should be collapsible areas to reduce the visual noise that would be off-putting to most new users. (though I'm of the opinion that clicking on the tag from the search should go straight to the filter works, but that's me.)

And a quick search side-note, when using the search in the top right, it does an 'any field' word search for everything in the archive, it doesn't bring the user to a tag list like many tag-oriented new users might have expected.

Using the Edit Search will help refine if from there, but it would be nice if there was something to indicate 'hey there's a tag under this thing you searched' to help with refining the search, better.

Once you get past the hurdle of understanding what you're even looking at when using the search, AO3 does indeed have some great filtering features that still does not seem to be matched anywhere else. But that hurdle is not exactly intuitive and I do think there needs to be some shaping up on AO3's part. (Among other things, but that's not this post. I am only here to point out issues with the function of its search and navigation choices.)

If you run into someone saying that AO3's search is bad or confusing, this is probably what they're talking about. If you want new users to use and enjoy the service, you need to listen to them and try to figure out where they're coming from instead of blowing them off. Because yes, in fact, AO3's search is very awkward and confusing to anyone not familiar with how it functions and belittling others for not getting it, is not helpful.

[fashionkissed]

                 “Sometimes when I’m sitting,                                         I wish I could be sitting harder.”

Indie Sutton Brady, from Freeform’s ‘The Bold Type’ Est. 2017, Rebooted 2022 Multi-Everything Semi Selective Not Spoiler Free

[lalficfeed]

the stedtrio develop typing quirks

by Chibi (HimejoshiHeart)

originally thought this up in relation to fanflash_works bold prompt, but. this uses CSS. so I'm posting it here and now it's a wip and i don't know what to do with it lol.

Words: 273, Chapters: 1/?, Language: English

Series: Part 8 of POV:

Fandoms: Live A Live (Video Game)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: F/M, M/M

Characters: FC: Duskie!Oersted | The Duskfall Kid (Live A Live), FC: HB!Straybow | Hibiscus Moonsmith (Live A Live), Tadokoro Akira

Relationships: implied hb x duskie.

Additional Tags: Discord - Freeform, Humor, Typing Quirks

from AO3 works tagged 'Live A Live (Video Game)' https://ift.tt/lJ0Tv8V

[tribridkissed]

WHERE YOU CAN FIND PYRO:

tribridkissed - Indie Canon Divergent Hope Mikaelson of CW’s Legacies (headcanon driven)

lilackissed - Indie Yennefer of Vengerberg of The Witcher (books, game and show based; headcanon driven)

drxgonkissed - Indie Bloom Peters of Netflix’s Fate: The Winx Saga

fashionkissed - Indie Canon Divergent Sutton Brady of Freeform’s The Bold Type (headcanon driven)

spellahxlic - Indie Zatanna Zatara of DC Comics (headcanon driven)

[jlalafics]

I just started watching The Bold Type and I feel like I remember you saying you watched it? Anyways, I'm still on the first season, but I'm already really invested and yeah

Hey love!

So, funny story, I saw the commercial for The Bold Type and was like, "Naw, I'm not going to watch this." Even though Hubbs was telling me that it seemed right up my alley having the fashion component and also that I was at one point, I was a fashion journalist major. At the time, it was on ABC Family now Freeform and a lot of the shows weren't my jam.

Anyway, about a year later, I was bored and looking through Hulu and it happened to be there so I decided to give it a try.

I was hooked.

I think it was because I could relate to each girl and liked each of them genuinely. Personally, my favorite is Jane because--surprise, surprise--she's the writer. However, Sutton has my dream job.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy it--please keep me posted on your thoughts!

[ao3feed-obikin]

On the Naughty List

read it on the AO3 at https://archiveofourown.org/works/52517794 by CreativeSweets, TheDarkSide ‘Anakin Skywalker’ it says, nice and bold, in his own scrawling hand and coal black ink at the top of his list; a list he doesn’t write, never has, because there’s something special about Christmas magic. It’s not something Obi-Wan has control over; Obi-Wan doesn’t believe in Santa and little elves, Obi-Wan believes that a list appears on the evening of the 5th of December, because that’s what happens. Obi-Wan couldn’t be arsed about the rest of it. Words: 9727, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English Fandoms: Star Wars - All Media Types Rating: Explicit Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Categories: M/M Characters: Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker Relationships: Obi-Wan Kenobi/Anakin Skywalker Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Trans Anakin Skywalker, Krampus - Freeform, Creampie, Watersports, Extremely Dubious Consent, Punishment, Spanking, Dacryphilia, Pregnancy, Top Obi-Wan Kenobi, Marking, Teratophilia read it on the AO3 at https://archiveofourown.org/works/52517794

[ao3feed-brucewayne]

Flying Saucer Has A Whole New Meaning To It

by Thicc_Personality Richard frowns at the anger in the man's voice towards Bruce...he knows he can pin this situation on the fact he is a literal child (and it would be a very good point to make) but he also knows better than to run off on dangerous missions without Bruce-ah...Bruce...the sudden thought of how worried he must have made his dad causes a wave of sadness to wash over the boy. Richard's lip wobbles and he sniffles, unaware of Superman's fretting at the sudden appearance of tears and snot as he mutters. "I-I w'nt B'tman!" Words: 2918, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English Fandoms: DCU, Batman - All Media Types, Superman - All Media Types Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Categories: Gen, M/M, Other Characters: Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson Relationships: Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Clark Kent, Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent & Bruce Wayne, Bruce Wayne/His Trust Issues, Bruce Wayne/His Paranoia, Bruce Wayne/His Jealousy, Clark Kent/His Curiosity, Clark Kent/His Inability To Leave Bruce Wayne Alone, Clark Kent/Enjoying Making Bruce Wayne Fluster Additional Tags: Humor, Fluff and Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Drugged Dick Grayson, Protectiveness, Protective Clark Kent, Protective Bruce Wayne, First Meetings, Flustered Bruce Wayne, Good Parent Bruce Wayne, Bold Clark Kent, Cute, Cute Kids, Clark Kent is Superman, Bruce Wayne is Batman, Dick Grayson is Robin, Gremlin Dick Grayson, Dick Grayson Needs a Hug, Dick Grayson Gets a Hug, Scheming Bruce Wayne, Bruce Wayne is Good With Kids, Superman loves Batman, Persistent Clark Kent, Aliens, Pasta, Flying, Flying Saucers - Freeform, Kitchenware via https://ift.tt/67VlUM4

[webseriesviral]

Freeform TV Show Ratings (updated 7/7/2023) - canceled + renewed TV shows ABC Family Freeform has had some very ... #movie quote #movies #movie line #movie line #movie scenes #cinema #movie stills #film quotes #film edit #vintage #movie scenes #love quotes #life quotes #positive quotes #vintage #retro #quote #quotes #sayings #cinematography

[wjdexclusives]

14K Gold Yellow White Freeform Twisted Teardrop Earrings 30mm

https://www.wjdexclusives.com/p/earrings/14k-gold-yellow-white-freeform-twisted-teardrop-earrings-30mm/

14K Gold Yellow White Freeform Twisted Teardrop Earrings 30mm

These exquisite earrings feature a stunning freeform twisted teardrop design, crafted with precision from 14K yellow and white gold. The intertwining of the two tones adds an elegant and dynamic touch to the earrings. With a height of 30mm, they make a bold and sophisticated statement. Elevate your style and showcase your unique taste with these eye-catching freeform twisted teardrop earrings that exude luxury and charm in radiant yellow and white gold.

Product Specifics All specifications are approximate and may vary for the same model.

Weight

1.4g

Metal

Yellow Gold, White Gold

Metal Purity

14K

Finish

High Polished

Earring Type

Drop/Dangle

Earring Backing

Hinged

Height

30mm

Width

18mm

Crafted in

Europe

Style ID: 11469 ZF-L (internal use only): WJDRCG-ER1484